(No subject)

[Guest guest]

I just wanted to let you all know what has been going on in my life

this week. I may not be available much for the next 2 to 3 weeks if I

am able to go home to see my mother, if I can even make it in time.

On Tuesday afternoon I was told by my sister in law that my mother was

being treated for Alzheimers. She had been treated for two months and

I had not been told. That was upsetting as well as shocking since

there is no history of alzheimers in our family and with all the other

diseases we are passing on, that was one we felt pretty confident

wasn't on the list. Wednesday afternoon I found out that my mother

had been taken by ambulance to the local hospital after being found by

her sister incoherent rocking on her bed in extreme pain in her back.

The local hospital could find no cause for her problems except that

she was severely dehydrated, had a kidney infection, and pneumonia

with fluid in her lungs, and an enlarged spleen. Her kidney function

went down to a gfr of 20 her heart beat was 140, very dangerous for a

women with a damaged heart from a previous heart attack. Yesterday

morning they sent her to a larger regional hospital. She was

increasingly less coherent, declined to go on analysis and the heart

dr. said then there really wasn't anything they could do for her. She

is being moved out of the cardiac unit into a more general unit for

the weekend, and as soon as my brother can find a hospice facility

which will take her that he would want her in, she will be going to

hospice. So over the last four days I have pretty much lost my

mother, just basically waiting for her heart to quit beating. It was

so quick, shocking, I am having a terrible time dealing with it. So,

if I seem distracted and mixed up, excuse me. Please pray for my

mother and my two brothers and myself. My brother who is in charge of

her care will not communicate regularly with me, so I talk to the

nurses and doctors directly. He is a supposedly recovering alcoholic,

has stopped drinking but is still the bully, controlling person he has

been most of my life. I was hoping we could work together especially

at a time like this but he is only open to informing us of the

decisions he has made. Jan